Return to The River
by LucyToo
Summary: Far from friends and without their father's help, four brothers must engage in the most difficult spiritual battle of their lives to save Raphael's mind and soul from being destroyed by an old enemy.
1. Prologue

Prologue

* * *

It remembered a time before the noises came. Feeding and swimming, thoughtless. When it hungered it ate. When it was tired, it rested. There was no thought. There was nothing but instinct.

But now the noises, echoing but from inside of it, not outside. Familiar, somehow.

Once it had made those kinds of noises. Once it had walked and thought, and those noises were called speech and the sounds were words.

But that was long ago. Now the words came and it heard them but it didn't understand. It swam and it fed, but there was no life in it anymore.

It should have been dead years before now.

It knew that in the same way it knew when it was hungry or when it was in danger. Instinct told it that it's time had been over long ago.

But it didn't die. It kept swimming. Fed by the fish, the turtles, the creatures in the river. Fed also by the noises, the voice. The Master. The thing inside it that spoke constantly and kept it alive. And waited.

Always waited.

At times it felt what the Master was waiting for. It remembered green flesh and a taste better than any blood. A taste like power. It hungered for that taste and despaired to ever find it again. The Master waited for the same thing.

The Master did not despair. The Master seemed to know the taste would be back.

And until the taste came back, The Master would keep it alive. To feed. To rest. To go on forever.

* * *

"Is that everything?"

"Yep."

Leo looked around, drawing in a deep breath and smiling to himself in instant contentment. "There is nothing like getting out of the city. Thanks again, April."

She smiled and slammed the back of the truck closed. "Hey, Splinter said you guys needed it. I'm still surprised he didn't come himself."

Leo sighed. Not surprised. That was the whole point of the trip. Splinter had been frustrated by the fighting that kept taking his sons' focus away from his spiritual lessons. He wanted them to focus on their minds for a while, and to accomplish what they could without his guidance.

He had been in one of his someday-I'll-be-gone moods when he told Leo to take his brothers out to the farm. Leo always took those moods seriously, but the part of him that was just son to a strong father couldn't help but think Splinter would be around forever.

He shook the thoughts free from his mind and smiled at April. "You'll look in on him, won't you?"

"I'll call every day. And go see him every other day. He'll get sick of me, don't worry."

"Good." Leo's smile faded. "He has no way to get in touch with us, and the lair has been invaded before. I just…"

Casey, done helping the guys lug their bags of supplies into the farmhouse, came up behind him. "Hey, Splinter said we should deliver a message if you start talking like that."

Leo turned to him. "Yeah? What message?"

Casey whomped him on the back of the head. Hard.

"Hey!" Leo jumped away, hands on his head. "Jesus, Casey!"

Casey grinned. "What? That was the message. That and 'tell those idiots to concentrate on their lessons instead of on me.'"

April shrugged. "He's right, Leo." She chuckled at the look Leo shot her, and raised her hands. "Okay, you guys are safely delivered. We're out of here."

Still rubbing his head, Leo moved back to the truck. "You'll call him?"

"I promise. Leo, don't worry about Splinter. Worry about your training." April smiled and kissed him on the cheek before she climbed back into the truck.

"So you'll come back in two weeks?"

"Unless Splinter tells us you're not ready yet." Casey moved around to the driver's seat. "Which, hell if I know how he'd know that from New York City, but."

Leo smiled. "He'll know."

"Creepy rat." Casey slammed the door and started the engine. He leaned out the window. "Yo! Guys! Leaving!"

The door to the farmhouse banged shut, and Leo looked back to his brothers. Mike stood in the doorway, waving, as Don and Raph headed down off the long porch.

Don came to the truck. "They'll check on Splinter? He's been feeling tired lately, and…"

Casey grinned at Leo. "Better deliver the message."

Leo obediently slapped Don on the back of the head.

"Ow! Leo!"

Casey laughed. "See you boys in a few weeks! Take care of the place."

"Take care of our father."

"We will. Yo, Raph! Later!"

Raph was looking out in the distance, past the bare green field and trees. He looked back and gave Casey a one fingered salute. "Later."

Casey laughed as he peeled out.

A few screeches and turns later, and the truck was gone.

They were on their own.

Leo breathed in another lungful of the air and sighed it out. Peace and quiet. Rest and meditation and training.

Heaven.

He pushed Don towards the house. "Come on. Unpack first, then we get started."

As they past Raph, he didn't move. His eyes were out in the distance again.

Leo let Don go ahead. "Hey. You okay?"

Raph shrugged, his face oddly thoughtful. "Yeah. Something about this place. I dunno."

Leo followed his gaze. Through the trees across the field, he could barely make out a thin slice of glittering silver. The water.

Hell, they could go swimming later. Maybe training could wait.

Leo threw an arm around Raph's shoulder. "Come on, bro. For once we're somewhere where nothing wants to kill us. There's no one around to steal a purse for miles. No Dragons, no Foot, no nothing."

Raph grinned at that. "Yeah. Nothing but your bossy ass ordering us around."

Leo pushed him in the arm. "Be nice and I'll save it for tomorrow."

"Deal."

Smiling, the two of them headed for the house.


	2. Chapter 2

The Master made noises almost all the time. Spoke his words though it couldn't understand or respond. Sometimes the words were louder, sometimes they were just a dull hum. 

Sometimes it almost understood. Sometimes the Master spoke so loudly and so intently that sound became urging, instinct as much as one of its own instincts.

_Go. _

Eat, swim, hide, sleep. Those instincts it understood. They had guided it its too-long life. 

_Go_ was a different instinct._ Go_ was the Master, but one of the few urgings it could understand and obey.

_Go_ came then, urgent and loud._ Go. Go now._

It went.

The Master spoke more words, louder than ever before, excited and urgent. It didn't understand those, but it understood go.

Somewhere in what mind it possessed, in what memory it could draw upon, it wondered if maybe it wasn't Time.

* * *

"Oh, look who's being a wimp." 

Raph rolled his eyes, dropping to sit on the bank close to Mike and Leo. "Wimp my ass."

"Come on, then. Get your butt in the water before Leo decides to not be fun anymore."

"I'm right here, Mikey."

"What? You know you're not fun. It's not like it's a secret."

Leo opted to ignore him. He floated on his back, sighing happily. The sun was setting, but still hot. The water was warm near the top, and the little brushes and curious bumps of the creatures in the river were comforting.

Life here. Not like the city, where everything was covered and paved and toxic. Concrete jungles weren't his kind of jungles. He wanted to open his eyes and look out on living things.

There was a spirit in everything. Splinter had taught them that once. A soul to every blade of grass and every insect that crawled on those blades.

Some didn't believe it. Some thought that souls belonged to humans. But there he and his brothers were, feeling and thinking. No one could tell Leo they didn't have souls, and no one would ever convince him that a toxic spill had formed those souls in them. They were born with their souls, and the toxic waste did nothing but give them a way to express it.

The same kinds of souls were in everything. The spiders, the leeches, the worms. The grass. The trees.

Leo thrived there. Or so it felt to him. He felt the spirit of everything.

It made him want to start their training. To get his brothers as in tune with the world as he was. Splinter told him he was advanced enough in his lessons to teach them to the others, and Leo hoped he was right.

But he floated and breathed and let his brothers have their evening off. They would take his lessons as work, until they were far enough along to enjoy them. It was best to let them approach the first lesson happy and rested.

"--to just push him in, Donnie!"

Leo blinked open eyes he realized were closed. He straightened, treading the water with minimal, instinctive movements.

Don was standing there, last to come down from the house. He was behind Raph, a smile on his face.

Mike was splashing loudly as he moved through the water towards the bank. "Come on, do it!"

Raph was glowering by then, and Leo wondered what he had missed.

"Donnie isn't gonna push me anywhere. Donnie doesn't have a death wish like his brother."

"Raph, you big wuss. Get your ass in here and swim!"

Don sat down beside Raph, spoke to him quietly.

Raph's glower faded to a more solemn frown.

"Oh, not you too!" Mike flopped back suddenly, sending a tidal wave back to disturb Leo's more graceful float.

"Just stop it, Mikey." Leo moved towards his brother, mentally surrendering the day to three overactive brothers who just spent hours in the back of a van.

Mike ignored him. "Donnie, get in here! We're frigging turtles, guys, we love this crap!"

Leo glanced at Don and Raph. He raised his eyebrows.

They both watched him silently. Raph's mouth was spreading into a slow smile.

Leo obeyed the unspoken wish. Treading so fluidly that Mike never heard him coming, he slipped under the water, compacted his muscles, and pushed out hard. Catching Mike around the middle of his shell he pulled hard, driving Mike under the water.

He surfaced to acknowledge the claps and whistles from the bank. He bowed his head modestly.

But Mike recovered fast, and when hands wrapped around his ankle he went under.

* * *

_Go._

_Go._

It didn't need the Master's guiding. It knew. It knew by then like a rush of warm, fresh food, or like escaping a predator. That hum, that life, that excitement.

The taste was there.

Finally.

It moved on its own then, knowing the hunt and the feed better than its Master.

Large forms moving violently, but it wasn't alarmed. It didn't want to go and hide. It knew it could never kill these creatures, but it knew they were full of food. It knew they held the taste.

_Go! Feed!_

But it didn't. It had its senses, and it knew that these creatures were close. Very close, but not the one. Not what it remembered.

Not exactly.

It went past them, shivering through the water faster than it had ever moved before. There was a glory in it that it didn't recognize but that drove it to push itself.

A third form, large, predator, too big, slipped into the water. Close again. So close, but not right.

_Feed! Now!_

It ignored its Master, thought the sounds were loud enough to hurt. It followed where the third had come in, and there.

There.

Just a skim at the top of the water. Just a piece of the creature, trailing close to the surface.

_Eat!_

It obeyed.

It found its target and fastened on, and glory came into it when the taste it knew and craved filled it. Power. Food, but more.

Something in it shifted. The noise, the Master, was silenced.

Gone.

It realized after only a moment. It was alone. The Master had abandoned it, had used it to open the veins of the green creature so Master could travel into it instead.

The Master had kept it alive through long years. The Master drove its soul to survive when its body was old and broken and rotting.

And with the Master gone, surviving was no longer possible.

Death came to it, so fast and so final that it died feeling only the victory of tasting what it had so long craved.

* * *

"Jesus Christ!"

His three brothers, cheerfully moving through the water, sending splashes at each other, all heard his shout and looked over.

Raph had skirted away from the bank, his foot in the air. "You've got to be fucking kidding me!"

Leo's smile vanished. "What? Raph, quiet down."

"Quiet down?" Mike laughed even as they all started for shore. "Who's gonna hear him?"

Leo didn't answer. His eyes were locked on Raph, on the foot he held out. There was something on him, something small and thin and…

"Oh my God." Don's voice beside him as they slogged up onto the bank.

Leo dropped on his knees. "Raph, hold still!"

"Get the fucking thing off!"

"Wait." Don stopped Leo as he reached for it.

They watched as the leech, spiny and shriveled, unstuck bit by bit until it simply fell to the ground.

Leo had no doubt it was dead.

Mike bent to look at it. "Yech. This is one ugly little sucker."

The moment it was off Raph shot to his feet, backing away. His face tinged with grey. "Jesus Christ."

Mike laughed. "Raph, it's just a…." He trailed off and sat up suddenly. The amusement was gone from his face.

Leo swallowed, suddenly realizing why Raph had been so sedate, and so hesitant to go in the water.

He looked down at the leech. There could be no doubting it was dead. The thing looked like it had been dead for weeks. This leech wouldn't be up and walking. It wouldn't return to suck Raph dry. Not this time.

He reached out, his hand a fist, and crushed the lifeless body into slime. Just in case.

He leaned over to rinse his hand in the water, and when he looked back Mike and Don were both standing by Raph. Raph's hands were on his arms as if he were cold. He was staring at the remains of the leech, breathing hard.

Raph frightened was prone to lash out and hit whatever was closest, and Don and Mike both knew that enough to stay a step ahead and not try to touch him.

"Hey, man, it's dead. It's okay." Mike's voice was low.

Don took over, more naturally soothing than Mike. "It's dead and you're fine. You're fine, Raph. It's not the same one."

Raph's breathing was starting to slow. His mouth pinched. "Of course it's not the same one. Thing would've died years ago. It's still a pretty fucking sick coincidence."

That was why he didn't want to go into the water. Damn it. How could Leo have just forgotten it? Too many other events, he figured with a frown, regarding the ruins of the leech and the water it had come from. At the time watching Raph lose himself bit by bit, stop speaking, lose muscle, until he was eventually back to the small petshop turtle they all once were had been huge. Jarring. Terrifying.

But since then there had been other terrors and other huge events, and this one had gotten lost in Leo's mind. Somehow even coming to the house again he hadn't remembered.

Don remembered, Leo realised. That was why he sat with Raph at first and didn't listen to Mikey.

Raph?

Leo sighed. Not much chance Raph would ever forget.

He pushed to his feet with a sigh.

Raph was still grey, but the fright was leaving his face. Fear never could sit on Raph for too long. "I mean, seriously. What the hell? How's it gonna go after my foot when you three and your fat butts were actually in the damned water?"

Leo moved to them. Raph would play it off, but Mike looked shaken by the memory, and Leo knew fun time was over.

He clapped Don on the shoulder. "Okay, guys. Maybe it's time to get inside."

* * *

He was free.

After ages trapped in the mindless prison of a shriveling animal, the Old Man was suddenly surrounded by thought. Intelligence. Comprehension. Power and strength, and when he spoke, he had no doubt this creature would listen and understand.

The thoughts of this mutant buzzed and swirled around him, nonstop. Loud and scattered, as all thoughts were. Illogical, confused. Intelligent, but not intelligent enough to detect him there.

This creature would give in to him.

The Old Man's power had waned in his leech prison. His anger had not.

These creatures had brought about his ruin. These four mutants had found him, had bested his pet, had brought the traitor Abanak to his banks. They had denied his wisdom, doubted his generous gifts. But they themselves hadn't defeated him.

No. The rat.

The rat was who he really wanted. Who he would see crushed to the ground. The rat and his tricks had deformed the Old Man, cut him off from his water, his atoms and quarks. The rat would pay, and pay hard.

He would take his time. Learn as his power returned what influence he could have on this beast he was inside of. Learn how to exert his influence. Learn how to destroy the rat, father to these mutants.

He would have his revenge.


	3. Chapter 3

Troubled dreams. Splinter said they were signs of troubled thoughts, and that the cure for dreams lay in calming the spirit when awake.

Raph thought that was crap. Or, if not crap, at least completely unhelpful.

Lying awake after a jarring, strangely vibrant nightmare about silence and being trapped in a living prison, Raph had no choice but to listen to his thoughts swirl and dwell in the memories that had been forced on him.

One stupid little worm. It was absurd to think about. One day years ago, breaking out of lessons earlier, falling from a broken tree limb into the waters, exploring and finding a hidden cave in the river.

Turtle eggs. He'd been fascinated. Back then he could still feel awe at small things like that. Tiny little turtles freshly hatched, peppering the water around the cave. Nothing to do, nowhere to go.

It could have been him. In a world without TCRI, it would have been. His brothers had pointed out that they'd never have been in a river somewhere. They would be trapped in some kid's aquarium or something.

But what difference would that have made? They wouldn't have known better. They would have been happy, he figured. Those turtles, those pets kept by so many people, they had to be happy.

There had been one turtle in the sand of the cave, unmoving, half buried in the dirt. He pulled it out to set it in the water with its brothers, and saw the leech.

Raph had always despised insects. Maybe it was an absurd fear, but fears were real. He'd pried the leech off the poor little turtle with a stick. The turtle was dropped into the water, and that was all that should have come of it.

He didn't blame his brothers. Entirely. After all, he'd been acting out that day. Restless, energetic. He'd wanted to enjoy the sun and the outdoors, not stand there meditating. Splinter took Raph's distraction out on the others, and they were rightfully ticked off.

They grabbed him right there in that cave, took that leech off the stick and put it on his foot.

And that was the start of it.

Maybe part was Raph's fault. When he got the thing off of him he was ready to kill it. He should have killed it. But he thought he was being merciful, letting it go. He thought he was being wise and zen about the whole damned thing.

By the next day he was already different. He felt unfocused, strangely foggy. He couldn't stand more than a few minutes of Splinter's lessons.

Things got worse fast. His brothers told him later that he had run-ins with the leech as it got bigger and he got smaller, but his memory was choppy.

All he knew was that with every passing hour he lost himself more and more. First his mind went. His reason. His words. Then his body, his reflexes, his muscles.

Everything became distant. His knowledge of things vanished bit by bit, even as his senses grew stronger. At the time it hadn't been a horrible thing. With his mind gone he couldn't realize what he had lost.

But remembering it later…

He didn't know if it was better, being a natural animal the way he was born to be. He knew that it felt like death in his memory. Like losing himself.

He was scared of it. Yeah. Fine. Hell, Raph was the toughest of his brothers in a lot of ways, but Raph had fears and he was pretty damned open about them.

He didn't want to go through it again. Not even the fear of it. That's what kept his ass on the bank with one foot trailing the water in the first place.

And a fucking leech found his fucking foot. What were the fucking odds?

His language went to shit when he was tired.

That made him grin at least, and he pushed himself up out of bed. No point trying to go back to sleep._  
_

_If you became that normal turtle again it would be as peaceful as sleep._

He blinked at the sudden - and rather loud and jarring - thought. Since when did he want peaceful?

He moved out to the front of the farmhouse, moving past the guest rooms where his brothers slept. He trudged down the stairs, and though it was wilderness and nature that caused this crap in the first place, he went out the door and stood on the porch.

Cool night after a hot day. It felt good. Clean air, no horns honking, nobody screaming. Just crickets and wind and the distant sound of a calmly flowing river.

_Go to the water_, he thought to himself suddenly, as odd and loud as before.

He hesitated, but started off the porch slowly. What did he want to go down there for?

_Proof_, came the answer.

He smirked to himself. Proof of what?_  
_

_That you're not afraid._

His steps stalled. That was stupid. He feared what he feared. The leech was dead, going back there wouldn't prove anything.

_Just go_.

The urging, like the thought, was stronger.

Raph didn't understand it, but he was never one to deny his instincts. He moved down the field beside the farmhouse, towards the silver of water.

His arm didn't itch, but he had a strange urging to scratch it. Not even a voiced thought like the others. Just an urge, implanted somewhere, that he instantly obeyed.

Fingernails scraped skin and he couldn't help but laugh. He had to be overthinking everything if he was scratching his damned arm and thinking about it twice.

The water came into view, and he hesitated. Seriously, what the hell was he doing--

_Go._

He let out a breath and went, wondering if it was some sixth sense guiding him. Maybe that spiritual plane Splinter'd sent them to get in touch with was calling out to him or something.

But the river just looked like the river. No distress, nothing to fix, nothing to rescue. Water and the bank and a rock where Leo had bashed that damned leech into pulp.

He stood there, because that's where his instinct had led him. He frowned out over the water, and felt something inside him, something loud and out of nowhere, and somehow…foreign.

A feeling of triumph.


	4. Chapter 4

_Author's Note - I promised I wouldn't forget this story, and see? Update. _

_Now, I had an author's note explaining the background of the story, but it's gone now. So for those who are confused about the plot, the Old Man and the leech and all, it's a comic from the Mirage series, a three parter called The River. I recommend finding it somewhere. It's fantastic. If nothing else, ninjaturtles dot com has a synopsis. It's issues 24-26 of the first run.  
_

* * *

It was a sad fact of life that Michelangelo had better concentration than Raphael did. 

Mike was like the poster child for ADD. He was always everywhere. Hyper, twitchy. Even when he sat and watched TV he couldn't watch one station for five minutes before he got restless and started flipping around.

But when they sat for meditation, when they went to lessons, Mike could absorb it all. Hell, the kid loved meditation, though it should have been torture for someone that active.

Raph wasn't so lucky. He never had been. If he was stalking some punk criminal he could be as still as a statue, patient and quiet. But in the outdoors on a sunny day, with birds chirping and wind blowing, how was he supposed to keep his mind focused?

"Concentrate," came Leo's voice, a floating sound on the breeze, calm and unobtrusive.

Raph opened his eyes, blowing out a sigh.

On his right Don and Mike kept their positions. In front of them, Leo knelt with his eyes open and unseeing. Meditation. Medi-frigging-tation. Boring boring boring.

He knew his brothers weren't paying attention, so he slumped and leaned back on the heels of his hands in the grass. He looked up at the sky, squinting at the bright, undisturbed blue. It was nice out there. Funny, he was so at home in the city, in the pollution and shadows and muck and grime. But here it felt just as right to him.

_You're part of nature. The city is a man-made stain on your soul_.

He sighed, annoyed. He'd been thinking random crap like that all day, and he couldn't shut it off. It was almost like Leo was in his head all the time, filling him with nonsense thoughts about nature and mutation and things he never had cared about much before.

'Man-made stain on your soul'. Honestly. Who even talked like that?

_No need to be rude_, his brain admonished him.

He grinned faintly and looked out past Leo at the glimmer of the water.

The river was in his thoughts a lot. Since his little nibble by the leech the day before, and his trip out to look at the water last night, he kept feeling like he should go back to it.

_Then go._

He shook the thought away. Couldn't go. Had to at least attempt to pretend to try to consider maybe thinking of caring about these lessons.

_Why?_

Dumb question. It was the whole reason they were out there.

_So your brother can attempt to teach you things that minds can only truly learn on their own?_

Raph shrugged to himself. He didn't know meditation, wasn't good at it. He'd always been the last one to see any images Splinter had tried to pass through--

_Splinter._

He blinked, shaking his head. A tension crept over him, fast and hot and…

Angry.

Why was he suddenly angry?

"Whoa."

Raph snapped back into position when he heard the soft word.

It was Mike, suddenly smiling, who opened his eyes first. "Whoa," he said again, louder.

Leo relaxed, his eyes focusing. "Not bad, Mikey."

"Yeah. That's awesome."

"Why didn't I feel anything?"

Leo chuckled and rose to his feet, a sign the rest of them could relax and move around. "Because you're over-thinking it, Don. That's always your problem when we try exercises like this. You want a chart or a manual to tell you how to do it, but it's instinctive."

"We gonna try again?"

"After lunch." Leo clapped Mike on the shoulder. "Go make lunch."

Mike grinned. "Raph? Your turn."

Raph sighed and stood. Since Mike got stuck with the cooking most of the time, one of them was usually assigned to go behind and help and clean his messes.

Thankless job, really.

He hesitated, though, eyes going to Leo as his brother stretched out with a pleased smile. "So if Don's over-thinking it what's my problem?"

Leo dropped his arms. "You know, Raph…I'm not sure yet. You're kind of…blocked. A big block."

"Yeah?"

Leo grinned. "You sound worried. It's not the first time. Even Splinter says you're a hard nut to crack."

Raph rolled his eyes and punched Leo in the arm. "Crack _your_ nut," he muttered as he jogged off after Mike. Leo's chuckle behind him made him smile.

He wasn't going to get worried. There was nothing unusual going on. He was thinking weird thoughts suddenly, but it wasn't anything to do with yesterday. Nothing to do with leeches. Leo said he was blocked, but…

Leo was right - even Splinter had a hard time reaching Raph, even when Raph was actually focusing.

The little shiver of anger tried to make him tense, but he pushed it away. No reason to get mad thinking about Splinter. Raph was hot-tempered sometimes, but not irrational.

He caught up with Mike right before he moved into the house. Letting the screen door creak shut behind him, he followed Mike to the kitchen to be his faithful sidekick. Martha to his Stewart, or whatever.

"Hey, Mike." He jumped up on the counter as Mike moved to gather ingredients for whatever meal he had planned. "What did you feel today?"

Mike grinned. "Just…Leo."

"Yeah? Kind of like a voice in your head, making your thoughts loud and stuffy and pretentious-sounding?"

Mike turned to him, brow furrowed. "What? No. Not like that. Almost like…you know when someone comes and stands behind you? Looks over your shoulder? And sometimes you can just tell who it is, instinctively? It was like that. Like he was just….there. It was pretty cool."

"Huh." Raph drummed his fingers on the counter, frowning to himself.

His mind called him a disrespectful beast.

He was starting to wonder about himself.

* * *

Abanak remembered the turtles, of course. Though he had aged years, centuries, since he had last seen them, he knew the moment they touched his water that his old friends had returned.

Abanak was not as he was. He was wiser. He was more pure. He was the river, and the river was in him. He could sense any creature in his water, and could summon and ignore them as his will desired.

The human side of Abanak desired very much to see his friends again. They had been the cure this river had needed. They had been the ones to reveal the Old Man to Abanak as traitor. As pollution to the river, rather than a god to help it flourish.

The turtles were not natural. They weren't pure and untainted like the turtles in his river. Yet they weren't evil. Like rivers polluted by man, they were soiled yet their origins were of the earth.

He understood such things better since becoming what he was - since taking his place at the head of the river. He understood that the Old Man had not been wicked. Like the turtles, there was the natural side of him, the pure side. Yet it had been tainted as well. Tainted over the course of centuries, tainted deeper and darker than other pollutions.

The Old Man, he thought at times, was not dead. He thought the spirit was still in the river, yet though Abanak could see and feel and speak to each fish and each worm, each floating algae and drooping water vine, he could not sense the Old Man.

Yet since the Old Man was no longer a threat to his river, Abanak was content to live and let live. It was the way of nature. Predators were to be feared and guarded against, watched when they came too close. Yet a predator who became docile was not to be hunted by its prey.

Not until it revealed that there was sharpness in its claws still.

* * *

Raph listened to Mike ramble as he assembled their lunch - sandwiches and something cold and noodly that Mike insisted humans were totally into when they ate out in the country. He straightened up after his absent-minded brother and relaxed bit by bit as his head didn't kick in with any loud comments.

He stuck his head out to call Leo and Don in when Mike was satisfied with the food, and they sat out around the picnic table outside the back door.

Raph looked out towards the river, grinned at Don as he sat down beside him. Everything was fine.

Mike brought out the food and set it down.

Raph's grin vanished. "Jesus, Mike!" He jumped off the bench, disgusted. "What the hell?"

Mike looked at him innocently. "What?"

"What?" Raph gaped at the platters. Squirming sandwiches, crawling white with maggots and he didn't know what the hell was in the pasta salad but it was red and thick like slurping clots of blood, and fuck. Raph wasn't queasy on even a bad day but this made him want to puke.

He backed away from the table. "The hell kind of joke is this?"

"Yeah. Uh, it's called lunch and you watched me make it. What's wrong with you?"

Raph stared at him.

Mike looked almost amused, brows raised high. Don and Leo were still at the table, watching Raph with matching confusion.

Raph blinked back at the table. It wasn't his imagination - the squirming white and clotted red still clung to the plates of food. He swallowed and fixed his eyes on Mike. "Okay, look. I'm gonna say this once - I am not gonna tolerate this shit. A couple of jokes, ha ha, whatever. But if you want to call me out for being scared yesterday then just do it."

"Raph, what are you--"

"The jokes end here. Okay? Enough."

Mike and Leo exchanged looks.

Don was actually picking up one of the foul sandwiches. "You're gonna have to be a little more clear about--"

Raph turned and walked off, leaving the table behind for the more somber silence of the trees and the river.

"Raph! Oh, come on!"

Fucking idiots. What the hell kind of sick joke…

_Forget them. Return to the water._

Yeah, yeah. He was going. He shook his head, annoyed. Mike liked his pranks, but that…that wasn't like him at all. That was disgusting.

He hesitated, his steps slowing. That wasn't like Mike.

He stopped moving, turning back, though he'd gone far enough that the table wasn't in view. Mike wouldn't play some joke like that. Don wouldn't reach for anything infested with maggots. Leo wouldn't play along with it.

What the hell was going on?

He frowned back at the water, then towards the house.

_Oh no. You'll not return there yet._

He ignored his mind and started back the way he'd come, his annoyance growing into worry. His own mind playing some trick? His eyes making up things that weren't there? Or…

_No._

He stopped moving, though he didn't intend to.

_I don't think you'll be eating today, little turtle. I don't think you'll be eating again._

Raph stood, still and frozen, and had the sudden, cold realization that there was something in his mind that wasn't right. It wasn't just nerves from the day before, or loud thoughts he didn't understand. Something was there.

Something was wrong.


	5. Chapter 5

_Author's Note - At the beginning I said this story would have slash in it. Well, we're this far along and the slash hasn't even poked its head out, so I think it's safe to say that my early judgement call was wrong. _

_No slash here after all. Just creepy spirits and a lot of leeches. Hope no one's too disappointed, but to start putting something in now would be kinda silly.   
_

* * *

What was he supposed to say? That his thoughts were strange? That he hadn't been able to move when he wanted to earlier?

Sounded nuts. He'd've thought it was nuts.

So he didn't say anything. He went back to the house and ignored his brothers' questions about what his problem was, and he showed them enough of a bad mood that they left him alone.

His dreams that night were as bad as anything he'd seen on the picnic table that day.

He saw a giant leech on two legs, speaking and holding on to his brothers as if to drink from them what he'd taken from Raph.

He saw Splinter hung in suspended animation in an alien building. He saw Leo falling through skylights. He saw what felt like every injury ever to hit one of his brothers.

He saw himself, going after Shredder, nearly getting killed. Unable to defeat him. He saw giant insects. Syringes. Himself, tied, helpless.

Every bad memory he had seemed to run accelerated through his mind. Like something in him was trying to look at them all, relive the bad. Discover his weaknesses and fears.

He felt a memory that wasn't his own - years spent in silence, trapped in a living prison. In a creature who couldn't respond, couldn't react. A withered, worm body swimming in endless cycles.

When his mind threw him out of the dreams, he blinked at the clock to find that not an hour had passed since he'd shut his eyes.

Sleeping became as unappetizing a prospect as eating.

He stood, shook the cobwebs of exhaustion from his mind, and went to the front of the house. Through the door.

To the banks of the river.

* * *

"Hey!" Mike's cheery voice made Raph wince. "You've been outside all morning? We figured you were still asleep."

Raph sighed and slogged heavy feet towards the house. Mike was on his own outside, which was a relief. He was easier to deal with than their other two brothers. He was more content to leave things alone.

Raph pasted a smile to his face. "Thought I'd get some morning air. Try some fishing or something."

"Fishing?" Mike laughed.

Raph relaxed at that. No questions, then. Nothing prying and deep. No mention of yesterday. Let it be - that was Mikey.

He shrugged and reached the picnic table. It was empty of any kind of food, but Raph still felt a little shiver of nausea. "Yeah. Fishing. Turns out standing there glaring at fish isn't enough to make 'em jump out, though."

Mike grinned. "You're a nutjob, Raph. Though I guess glaring is better than taking your sai down there and trying to spear the poor things."

Raph sat down at the table. The sun felt too bright, and the day was still too cool. He was oddly light-headed - though after one hour sleep and not eating much of anything yesterday, maybe it wasn't so odd after all.

"Hey. You okay?"

He blinked and looked across at Mike. Smiled.

Mike drew back, his eyes going wide. Whatever was in Raph's smile he obviously didn't like it. "What's wrong?"

_Tell him._

He ignored the thought. Voice. Whatever the hell it was. "Nothing. Just didn't sleep last night."

"Tell Leo! He was saying something about taking the day off to do a little hiking - he and Don, Raph, they're nuts about this place. Anyway, give him a reason and he might give in."

"Maybe." Raph dropped his head to his hands, rubbing at heavy, grainy eyes. "I don't think this fresh air's good for me."

"Yeah? You look like you might be getting sick or something. Hey! I could make you a big breakfast, put some bounce back in your step.

_No._ "No."

The words came together so quick, in thought and in voice, that Raph wasn't sure which was him and which was this dark voice in his mind.

When he looked up Mike's eyes were wide on him.

He grinned unevenly. "I ate before I went out this morning. Don't think it's sitting too well."

"You're turning down food? Jeez, Raph, if you don't talk to Leo I'll do it for you.

"No."

He swallowed, cold worry shivering down his spine. That 'no' had been the voice of his thoughts - like his own voice, but darker. Different, in some gut-level way he couldn't describe. But that hadn't been a thought. That had been pushed through his own throat and spoken out loud.

_Relax, little turtle. The sooner you accept, the easier this will be._

Accept what? He dropped his face into his hands again, focusing on his breathing. In and out.

"Raph?" Mike's voice sounded distant.

The voice in his mind was the only clear sound he could hear.

_Accept that you don't belong to you anymore. _

He didn't think the words, the question that instantly rose up. But the thing in his head, this presence, must have picked up on it anyway, because it answered.

_Me, of course. You belong to me._

* * *

Leo wasn't capable of being lazy. Not on his most relaxed days. When he gave them time off from training, it wasn't to rest and lounge around, waste the day. It was to explore more of this world they didn't get to see nearly enough.

It was to go with Don down the overgrown paths in the woods around the house. To point out deer, rabbits, birds. To hear the songs from the branches overhead and the chirping of insects. To feel the sun on their skin.

He wasn't lazy. He did realise he'd have to buckle down on training after this, but a day to simply be outside and experience the topside world as if they were part of it was too much to resist.

Besides, Mikey was picking up the lessons incredibly fast, and Don was starting to catch up. Raph…

Well. Raph was the only reason Leo ended up regretting the day he spent out in the woods.

Coming back to the house it was Mikey who spoke to him, gesturing towards the river, worried.

Now Leo was picking his way down to the water's edge, looking for a wayward brother who, if Mikey were to be believed, was a few steps from death.

He found Raph sitting with legs in the water, looking out over the colors the setting sun sent dancing on the surface of the river. He moved in, making his steps heavy so he didn't surprise Raph.

Raph tensed, but didn't move.

Leo sat down beside him. "Hey. I wouldn't have thought you'd want to touch this water again after what happened…?"

Raph's leg lifted, one foot coming out of the water and dripping over the surface for a moment before sliding back in. "I think I'm safe."

Leo looked over at him.

He'd planned some kind of joking comment about Mike's fright, but the joke withered and died when he saw his brother's face.

Sunken eyes and blank expression, and okay. Something was really wrong. "Raph?"

He didn't even have to ask. Raph drew in a breath, let it out, and looked over at him. "I'm not sleeping right."

"Something on your mind?" Leo searched his face, speaking carefully. Too easy to set Raphael off when quizzing him about himself.

Raph frowned. "I've been having strange thoughts."

Leo's shoulders squared. "What kind of thoughts?"

Raph gestured at the water. He leaned in, reaching to trail his fingers over the surface. "Ever get a song stuck in your head?"

Leo shrugged.

"It's like that. But it's not a song."

"Raph…what is it?"

Raph smiled to himself, a soft expression. His hand gestured, almost like beckoning someone to come to him. A moment later he slid his hand further into the water and came up with something in his fist.

Leo grimaced. A leech slithering in his hand. A smaller, healthier leech than the one that had attached to Raph the other day. It was pretty safe to say that not one of the four of them would ever be fond of leeches.

Raph held it up, his eyes shining, his face calm. "You ever wonder what something like this might think about? What it's like inside this tiny head?"

Leo blinked. "No."

"Know something funny? I think I could tell you. I think I know."

Leo's eyes went from the worm to Raph.

Raph met his eyes over his outstretched hand. He squeezed his fist, and a soft, wet sound came between them. The leech stopped squirming.

Leo nearly drew back as Raph held his hand over the water and let the dead worm fall to the surface and vanish beneath.

* * *

The sun beat down from a wide blue sky. The grass was fragrant and itchy beneath him. The wind blew, the trees in the distance shook with wind and birds. His head felt empty, unclear. Tired.

God, he wanted to be somewhere else.

_No wonder. These lessons are juvenile nonsense._

He shut his eyes tight and focused on clearing his thoughts.

_You'll never shut me off. I'm already in your mind._

His eyes opened. He wanted to scream.

_Don't worry, little beast. With me you'll be stronger than you ever were before. _

He was going nuts. One little leech days ago - that had to be what caused it. His mind had just snapped.

_Your mind is healthier than it has ever been._

That was obviously bullshit. He couldn't even meditate. And honestly, how fucked up was a person's mind when they couldn't sit still and think?

_Meditation is a waste of time concocted by monks in faraway places who wanted to teach the same passive nonsense that every other religion teaches its subjects in a different form._

Raph looked out at Leo, so deeply absorbed in the lesson. At his brothers, learning. Paying attention and not hearing voices in their minds. Not crazy.

All he had to do was open his mouth and say something. Tell them something was wrong. They would understand. Even something as ridiculous as a voice in his head wouldn't jar them. All of them had seen too much freaky shit in their lives to ever take something like that lightly.

He just had to talk to them. But even as he thought that, as he looked at them in longing, he made no move to speak. Whether his own pride kept him quiet, or whether it was something darker that wasn't from him at all, he didn't know.

_They're already trying to find out, you know._

He frowned.

_I can sense them, though you can't. Your brother has instructed them to direct their focus on you. I feel them probing at your mind, trying to see inside. Trying to see me._

Raph looked over at Mike and Don, so calm and silent and still. He shut his eyes and drew a deep breath, and tried like hell to open his mind to them. If they could see they could help. If they were trying maybe they knew.

Leo. Leo had to have been more bothered the night before than he acted. Thank fucking God for Leo.

_You can be more than this, little turtle. More than these idiots sitting here trapped in their own weak minds._

His brothers weren't weak. Each one of them had survived things that would have killed weaker creatures. Even this, the training, was about strength. There was power in their minds.

Splinter had fought with them in battle though his body was in a different place. It was Splinter who saved them the last time they were here. Raph stopped the leech, but the maniac controlling it had been bested by Splinter, though Splinter was back at the house.

Hot anger boiled in his gut instantly. Foreign anger, but inside him. His, but not his.

_The rat has nothing to do with this. Meditation is submission. It isn't power. Perhaps you'd like to see what sort of deeds your mind might be capable of._

Raph blinked, and as quick as that blink his mind blanked. His thoughts cut off - the loud thoughts and the quieter, confused ones. He didn't think, he only felt.

Malevolence, deep and hot, rose inside him. A burning in his gut that opened his eyes and made him straighten from his slump.

Confidence brought a smirk to his mouth, and his eyes focused on Leo sitting so calmly in front of them.

Fool. He thought he had the power to teach what he couldn't even understand. What Splinter couldn't understand. Power. Control. Energy. They were all above the understanding of any body-bound beasts.

Any but Raphael. He did have power. He had far more power than anyone thought. More than Leonardo. More than the rat.

The rat… Raph shook his head, trying to stop the thoughts. Not him, he shouted in his head. This wasn't him.

But it _was_ him. He looked to Leo, at his dull, open eyes and slack face. Leo had ordered his brothers to break into Raph's mind. Leo thought he had the power. Ridiculous.

Raph only had to reach out a tendril of his mind, a fraction of his own power, and then?

Leo's eyes focused suddenly, and looked directly at Raph.

Raph smiled.

Then he only had to strike.

Leo's eyes widened. A glare like sheer white light flashed over Raph's vision, and though he didn't move a muscle, he knew he had just bested an enemy. Victory sang in him, though such a minor victory over such a small opponent.

When the light cleared from his sight, Leo was lying still. Flat on his back, and yards behind where he had been kneeling. As if he had been punched solidly by a real fist and been sent flying.

Don and Mike were already up, running to him.

_Power. Everything is power. And you have more power inside of you than they could ever dream of. _

He wanted to run up to Leo, to check with his brothers that Leo was alright.

He wanted to laugh, to stand over Leo and watch him wake up, and see fear in his eyes.

But he couldn't move. His mind wouldn't let him.


End file.
